CHP leader criticizes Erdoğan’s remarks on Kavala case

ANKARA

Main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) chair Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu on Feb. 3 said that President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s remarks regarding the jailed businessman Osman Kavala decision of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe damaged Turkey’s reputation and gave the world a message that the country lacks democracy.

“This statement has damaged the reputation of the Republic of Turkey. This statement means, ‘There is no constitution, law or laws in our country. We do not recognize international conventions. We only govern our country as we wish. We get the decision we want from the court’,” Kılıçdaroğlu told reporters.

Turkey has a constitution, which requires the government to abide by the ECHR’s decisions, the CHP leader said and stressed that Turkey’s judiciary must comply with the rulings of the European body.

Ankara accuses the Council of Europe of interfering in an ongoing judicial process on Kavala after the body’s political organ has voted in favor of moving the infringement procedure against Turkey forward.

The Committee of Ministers by a majority vote on Feb. 2 in Strasbourg decided to ask the European Court of Human
Rights (ECHR) whether Turkey has infringed the European Convention on Human Rights by not implementing the court’s verdict on Kavala.

The ECHR had ruled that Kavala’s rights were breached in late 2019 and asked Turkey to release the civil society activist and businessmen who has been behind bars since 2017.

“We never recognize those who don’t recognize our courts. What the ECHR has said, or what the Council of Europe has said, are not our concern,” Erdoğan said on Feb. 3.